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Roads to Berlin maps the changing landscape of Germany, from the period before the fall of the Wall to the present. Written and updated over the course of several decades, an eyewitness account of the pivotal events of 1989 gives way to a perceptive appreciation of its difficult passage to reunification.
Nooteboom’s writings on politics, people, architecture and culture are as digressive as they are eloquent; his innate curiosity takes him through the landscapes of Heine and Goethe, steeped in Romanticism and mythology, and to Germany’s baroque cities. With an outsider’s objectivity he has crafted an intimate portrait of the country to its present day.
Nooteboom’s writings on politics, people, architecture and culture are as digressive as they are eloquent; his innate curiosity takes him through the landscapes of Heine and Goethe, steeped in Romanticism and mythology, and to Germany’s baroque cities. With an outsider’s objectivity he has crafted an intimate portrait of the country to its present day.
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Reviews
'a luxurious detour in the lands and history of Germany' Metro.
'demanding, thorough and quite invaluable to those who want the opportunity to inform themselves before contemplating what the future holds for Central and Eastern Europe' Bookbag.
'His Berlin reportage, from a 1963 Khrushchev rally in East Berlin to the tearing down of the Palast der Republik, brilliantly captures the intensity of the capital and its 'associated layers of memory' The Economist.
'It is a wonderful voyage of self-discovery, and a psychological exploration of a nation in turmoil' Financial Times.
'Nooteboom wears his erudition lightly, and weaves personal anecdote into memorable reportage' Sunday Telegraph.
'There is a melancholy in his writing and a nostalgia for the past, both of which are very German - or at least used to be' Spectator.
'writerly, abstract, walled off in his head ... He reminds us how fast the communist world fell apart, with unimaginable reversals of fortune' Literary Review.